Chapter 9 #3
“There’s a need if ye want clean clothes, dear. She takes care of me laundry as well. She earns good pay that helps her family. Ye wouldna want to deprive her of food or tea?”
I sensed it was an argument I could not win. And it was a fact that I had brought just one change of clothes from London, other than what I now wore.
“I can pay her.”
“Of course, dear.” And she was gone with my clothes.
Silence filled the small flat. I took a bite of biscuit, then a sip of coffee.
He had not asked, yet questions were there.
“I was able to learn information about the woman from the Close who was found murdered in the Grassmarket.”
I did not go into detail about sneaking a look at the police report when Inspector Landry had stepped away.
“I found the vendor’s name...” I caught the look Munro gave me and chose to ignore it.
“He works in the Grassmarket,” I continued. “He was able to show me where she was found.”
I didn’t know what Elizabeth might have shared with him about my return yesterday and chose to say nothing of the encounter at the market.
My bag remained where I had obviously left it when I returned the previous evening. I retrieved it, pulled out my notebook and opened it, then pulled out that badly stained feather.
“I found this at the bottom of the crate where her body was found.”
As I handed it to him, there was a shadowy image as if someone stood at my shoulder. It was Meggy Adams as she walked through the marketplace, stopped, argued with one of the vendors, and then moved on with a disagreeable word...and a man.
A memory of the things I’d learned from Mr. Meeks?
Mikaela Forsythe once said that once things were seen, they were always there, like a photograph.
Still, I had not actually seen Meggy Adams at the market or her bloodied body, only what was left behind.
“Are ye all right, lass?”
I nodded. “Of course.”
He was not convinced.
“It is a bold colour,” he commented, turning the feather over in his fingers. “Not one might find at the poulterer’s.”
“None of his chickens have this colour feathers. It is more the colour that would be found on an exotic bird such as the ones Mikaela and I saw in Africa.
Elizabeth had returned. Her eyes widened as she saw the feather.
“Something one might find on a fancy gown on a lady at a soiree, or fancy man,” she commented.
“Where might a feather of this sort be bought?” Munro asked.
“Perhaps a lady’s shop on the Royal Mile,” she replied. “Or possibly the haberdashery at Jenners. I used to purchase handkerchiefs for my husband there. They were verra fine quality even though he said I was foolish.” She was thoughtful.
“The manager of the department is a man by the name of Mr. Woolsey, a fine man who always had time for me when I went there. He always insisted on serving me, rather than letting one of the clerks there do so. He might verra well be able to tell ye something about that feather.”
It was very near the time of the day when the store opened for the day. It was decided that we would go there and try to learn something about it that might be important.
“Lovely colour as it is, ye canna go with that bruise for everyone to see,” she informed me.
“Come along and we’ll see what can be done. I hope ye gave as good as ye got,” she added as she led me into her bedroom off the parlour.
I sat before the dressing table mirror in her bedchamber as she applied first the cream and then the powder.
Munro had gone to find a driver to take us to the department store. The room was quiet with only the sound of the rain that pelted the window.
“There is a children’s nursery rhyme about crows.” I caught the curious look on her face in her reflection in the mirror.
“Aye,” she replied. “’Tis well known.”
“One is a warning, two for joy... I don’t remember the rest of it.”
“One is for sorrow, two is for joy, three for a letter, four for a boy,” Elizabeth replied.
“Five is for silver, six for gold, seven for a secret, never to be told,” she continued. “Eight for a wish, nine for a kiss, ten for a bird you must not miss.”
The room was silent once more. I looked up to find her watching me from that reflection.
“There are those who believe that the crows are messengers,” she softly said. “Ye have seen them.”
I forced a smile as I gave myself quick inspection in the mirror then stood. “They are everywhere,” I replied, determined to ignore the encounter.
There was a knowing smile on her face when I glanced at her.
“Aye. Some say they speak to those with the gift. Here,” she said as she went to the narrow closet and retrieved a coat. She held it open for me.
“It’s a bit long as yer a mite shorter than meself, but it will keep ye dry and warm.”
“I cannot take yer coat,” I exclaimed.
“It’s for certain that yer determined to go on about yer business whatever it is. And the weather can be sunshine one minute, a downpour the next as ye well know.” She eased it around my shoulders.
“I’ll not have ye soaked through and coming down with fevers, and I have no need of it for now. I won’t be out and about today. At least one of us has some sense about it.”
I thanked her.
She gently laid a hand against my other cheek.
“Dinna be afraid of wot ye were born with.”